Russian super-rich build their own golf courses

Their penchant for super-yachts and owning football clubs is well known but
Russia's tycoons are now shopping for a new rather larger status symbol:
their own custom-built golf course.

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Ian Woosnam on the 18th hole at The Pestovo Golf & Yacht Club in Moscow Photo: GETTY IMAGES

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Oleg Deripaska: the Russian billionaire is engaged in a fierce battle for control of Norilsk Nickel.Photo: BLOOMBERG

By Andrew Osborn in Moscow

6:30PM GMT 01 Jan 2010

Shrugging off concerns about Russia's long snow-bound winters and the fact that many of their fellow compatriots can barely afford a set of golf clubs let alone a golf course, some of Russia's richest business people are pouring their millions into a pastime whose aristocratic overtones made it taboo in the Soviet Union.

"Only the super rich can afford golf courses," says Chris Weafer, a strategist at Moscow's Uralsib bank who keeps a close eye on how the oligarchs spend their wealth.

Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich is one of the tycoons taking the plunge in the country where he made his fortune. His spokesman said a sprawling course beyond Moscow's outer ring road is already "in the planning stage."

Metals tycoon Oleg Deripaska is ahead of the curve. He already has an exclusive £18.5 million Jack Nicklaus-designed championship course in Moscow. The initial membership fee is a cool £185,000 and the club says it is extremely picky about who it allows to join.

Vladimir Potanin, who made his money from Russia's vast nickel reserves, is also in the process of building a course, as is Elena Baturina, Russia's richest woman. But it is Andrei Komarov, a senator in Russia's upper house of parliament whose wealth comes from steel pipes, who seems to be the most committed. He is ploughing £370 million into a chain of golf clubs in three Russian regions.

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It is an unlikely trend for a country that has little history of golf. Modern Russia's first course only appeared in 1989 in the twilight of the Soviet Union and even now the world's largest country only boasts 14 courses and around 15,000 golfers. Vladimir Putin, the prime minister, prefers judo and the sport was so alien when it first appeared in the 1990s that some wealthy Russians had to be asked not to park their cars on club fairways.

But in a country where status is king and the pursuit of exclusivity a national sport, associating oneself with golf is seen as a way to buy cachet and something that Russia lost when the Bolsheviks came to power in 1917: class.

"It is just an extension of the 'I've got the biggest yacht' mentality," says Mr Weafer. "It is a question of status and a toy. Many of these clubs appear to have no commercial purpose. They are trophy assets."

It is also a handy way for an oligarch to burnish his patriotic credentials. With golf set to become an official event at the 2016 Olympics, the Kremlin wants Russia to field a decent team. In Russian eyes, the Olympics, as in the Soviet era, are a global platform to flex the country's geopolitical muscles through sport. The fledgling Russian Golf Association has a Soviet-style five-year plan to ensure Russian shines at the games. It wants to boost the number of golf enthusiasts to 100,000 players by 2014, to increase the number of golf courses to 100, and for Russians to start winning both professional and amateur tournaments.